LeMob has quickly gained a flattering reputation. Actually, two swiss motion graphics major figures have wisely decided to link up: Bart Wasem and Neil Stubbings. There is a very cinematographic style in their work, a propensity for 2.5D and a sense of humor delivered (like in the recent short Lost and Found) that are rooted in their inventive directions. If you are an After Effects lover, you shouldn't ignore their mastery of the tool and search for some instructive behind the scenes in their portfolio.
The Brothertunes music video, is again very cinematographic with a "Sin City" look. Nevertheless, the piece has its own identity which makes it a success.
Here is a little Q&A with Bart Wasem, director.

- How did you visualize the creative concept ?

After a basic idea/story, we started right away with the storyboard sketches and generated the illustrative style we wanted to go to. Working on both processes at once (storyboarding and style development) was very important because the style affects pretty much the storyline, the setting and at least the action of the main characters (the band). After that we started building the whole illustrative setting and the camera moves in After Effects in order to exactly know what we will shoot in the studio. With this accurate animated shootingboard, we were able to work very precise and fast concerning the characters action and duration of each take. We shot in the studio in front of a green screen with a Panasonic HD cam in only 1 day.

- Please give us some insight on the mix between live action and cg. How long did production and post-production take for this music video ?

It's always challenging when you mix live action and cg, because on one hand you have to know exactly how the take needs to be shot but also what you can fix and adjust in the post afterwards. After the shooting, another 4 weeks were needed to adjust and complete the clip. The whole piece was made with AE and for the rain two main packages were used: RealFlow and Houdini.
RealFlow was used for the 3 puddle splashes. It was important for the project to give the splashing water a streaky, almost a comic book look without losing the believable fluids behavior. The shading of those effects was then done in Cinema 4D to keep the pipeline simple. Houdini was used for the remaining 3D effects, such as the rain, water interacting with surfaces, confetti streamers and flying umbrellas.
Finally the realisation from concept to completion took around 2 1/2 months.

- What was the most challenging part of this work ? What was the most pleasant one ?

The most challenging part for this job was a tight budget (as usual for music videos) but the fully creative freedom in every step was a big pleasure though.

- Anything you want to add ?

LeMob stands for a high-end combination of live action with motion graphics. Movies is our passion and we are mostly satisfied when we can bring a story together with the adequate visual style. we have two short movies secondary in the pipeline which we are planning to finish next year.

To go further, check out Brothertunes' materials.

Credits:
Music Video for «Brothertunes» - Songtitle: «Better»
Production: LeMob motion design studio
Director, Designer, Animation & Editing: Bart Wasem, LeMob
Creative Support: Neil Stubbings, LeMob
Technical Support: Matthias Zurbriggen, LeMob
3D Rainmaker & VFX Supervisor: Roman Altenburg
Camera: Marco Barberi
MakeUp: Ingrid Gerber